Moran Company Report Assesses True Impact of DRA Cuts

To educate Congress and other governmental bodies on the detrimental effects of these cuts, the ACR has joined a broad coalition of patient advocacy groups, medical manufacturers, and providers to form the Access to Medical Imaging Coalition (AMIC). AMIC represents more than 75,000 physicians, providers, and patients, as well as medical imaging manufacturers who employ tens of thousands of workers.


A report by the Moran Company- released by the AMIC -finds that the cuts in Medicare imaging payments under the DRA will mean that the total Medicare reimbursement for imaging services in physician offices and imaging centers will fall an estimated 18 percent to 19 percent below total reimbursement for similar services in hospital outpatient departments.

The report also found that, in 2007, 89 percent of the services affected by the DRA limits will be paid at rates less than the estimated cost of performing the service in the physician office setting.

"The effects of the DRA imaging cuts are, and will be, deeper and more far reaching than anyone involved in the formulation of the DRA could have imagined," Moore said. "We believe the pause called for in this legislation will allow Congress to get all the facts and receive input from radiologists, the medical experts in this area, and other stakeholders. It will enable the creation of a more effective approach to these services and allow patients to more readily receive high-quality imaging care."

To read the Moran report, an update of a similar analysis done by The Moran Company in September 2006, in its entirety, please visit the AMIC Web site at www.imagingaccess.org.

For more information regarding the Access to Medicare Imaging Act of 2007 or the DRA, as well as the latest on the ACR's efforts to oppose the DRA imaging reimbursement cuts, please visit the "Imaging under Attack" section of the ACR Web site at http://www.acr.org/s_acr/doc.asp?CID=2537&DID=23825.

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